The journey to discovering how to feel better about yourself starts with you. From developing your self confidence and increasing your self esteem to minimizing negative self talk, there are steps to taking back your own feelings. While it's easy to blame our past mistakes for our low self esteem, you can still develop positive self views for the sake of your mental health and well being. In this article, we'll share actionable tips on how to feel better about yourself in 2025.
How to feel better about yourself
1. Celebrate life
Get your record straight and try to understand that the world is not against you. It is not responsible for all your misfortunes or challenges. Some of the things we face are triggered by our actions, and you should always come up with ideal solutions. Focus on correcting your mistakes and view life experiences as a learning lesson. Survival is for the fittest, and you need to grow some confidence and ego to help you face life challenges. Life lessons and challenges are inevitable, so you need to be hopeful and positive. Make a life, your friend, and never play blame games because you will only despair and lose hope.
2. Don't Give Up
When things get tough or you’re feeling trapped, go harder. You don’t want to stagnate in life. You need to face your problems and find the ideal solutions. Developing such a drive will only make you stronger and wiser since you’ll hold the key to unlocking your potential. It is always a good feeling to conquer a problem that you initially perceived as impossible. It builds confidence to a whole new level, which will change your way of thinking. Consider every challenge as an opportunity to learn and grow. Use your positive energy and thoughts to overcome obstacles that may be pulling you down. Whenever you go off track, take the initiative to fight back and regain your original position.
3. Spread kindness
To know how to feel better about yourself, the solution is simple: become a good person. Often, when we feel bad about ourselves, we cycle negative thoughts in our heads. We might spend time talking about ourselves more than listening to others. Our own life becomes more important than anything else. And while it's important to know your self worth, you can get a lot of positive feedback by helping others.
Challenge yourself to do an act of kindness or good deed every single day. Throughout your day, look for opportunities to spread kindness to family members, friends, coworkers, and strangers. Within a month or so, you'll notice your thought patterns have changed. Instead, of beating yourself up, you'll feel more confident. Plus, you'll finally achieve self acceptance because you've become a better version of yourself.
In challenging situations with difficult people, lift them up. Be people's cheerleader. Even if everything in your soul tells you to do the opposite. You'll quickly diffuse situations you never thought were even fixable.
4. Notice how you think
Nobody is perfect, and we are bound to attract negative energy and thoughts. Simply we can’t always possess 100 percent positive thoughts. However, you need to learn how to feel better about yourself and how to be more positive. You need to be flexible enough to help you adapt to a particular situation. Stay open to new ideas and always come up with a solution for any challenging situation.
Just come to terms with the fact that negative thoughts are part and parcel of life. The difference between successful people and less successful individuals is how they react to their negative thoughts and challenges in life. You can turn your negative thoughts into your stronghold and maybe your springboard in life. This will help you learn how to get our of your head and into a better state of mind.
5. Practice gratitude
The easiest way to start learning how to feel better about yourself is to practice gratitude. You can find countless gratitude journals online with journal prompts to guide you. If you write down ten things you're grateful for at the start or end of each day, you'll start to feel good about your situation. There are so many advantages you might have that other people would love. Having access to the internet, being able to connect with people via email, having friends, clean water, being alive in this world, or being able to exercise, there's so much that you can appreciate in your life. It's all a matter of perspective.
To begin feeling gratitude, take a look at a gratitude list that someone created online. You can pull examples from other lists and eventually start coming up with your own. Look for the small moments that bring you joy. Become aware of the good things in your life to feel better about yourself.
6. Build up self-trust
You need to trust your gut instincts and abilities to help you come out of any sticky situation. Always give it a try, and you will be surprised how you efficiently manage your problems. When you fail to reach an ideal solution, you will have the experience that will help you tackle a similar situation. You will feel better about yourself because it will imply that you have total belief in your potential and ability. If you are of a balanced state, then you are smart to figure things out. The secret behind achieving something on your own is practicing patience and a positive attitude. Remember, tough times don’t last, but tough people do. Trust the process and your abilities when things work out for the best, you will feel better about yourself for not giving up.
7. Meditate
If you struggle with low self esteem, it's key to meditate. A guided meditation can improve your well being. It's all about becoming aware of your thoughts. Often, we have ruminating thoughts that lead us down rabbit holes of negative thinking. But when we notice them surface, we can stop them. It's when we don't pay attention to them spiralling out of control, that we lose our self confidence.
There are meditations for self worth, positivity, going through a hard time, mindfulness, and loving kindness, that can help you foster more positive emotions. Those times when you feel you don't have a friend or can't see a therapist for another week, you can practice meditation to calm the mind and reduce the hurt. Sometimes, all you need to do is imagine something better. And with a guide or visualization, you can work to feel better about yourself.
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8. Focus on self-improvement
While you might be asking, "what is wrong with me?" it's important to know that a fulfilling life entails self-improvement. If we always stayed the same, things would never get better. How you handle social situations will change as you gain confidence. Adding an exercise routine, such as mindful walking, will also boost confidence. Putting in effort into your relationships can make them better. A focus on health will strengthen your energy levels and spirit. Spending time with a friend weekly can help you enjoy your social life. There are countless ways to improve yourself, that will directly impact how to feel better about yourself. Start at the root of the problem, and research ways to overcome obstacles like the ones you face.
9. Summon your inner strength
At times you will never realize how mentally strong you are until being strong is the only option you have. Whenever life challenges harbor your life journey, you need to grow some level of confidence. Believe in yourself when challenging yourself and gather all your inner strength. It will make you a better person when you learn how to how to feel better about yourself. Always have a constant reminder that you still survived tough times by improving your way of thinking and perceiving things. You will always feel proud of your efforts once you manage to conquer any underlying issues and challenges. Always trust your intelligence and inner strength to help you deal with problems.
10. Cut out negative people
The toxic people in our lives can shatter our self confidence and self esteem. To feel confident again, sometimes removing key people who cause us pain is the path to happiness. If you want to feel good about yourself, it's important to surround yourself with positive people. You don't need to direct message or e-mail someone to tell them you're cutting them out. Reducing contact until it's non-existent works too. Realize that your sense of worth relies on your actions. If you have good friends, you'll feel better about yourself. So, one of the ways to feel better is to make new friends that leave you feeling good. The perspective of a negative person shouldn't outweigh your own though. So, add more value to how you see yourself, and make sure it's positive.
11. Practice self-love
You need to understand that life is not scripted, and your condition is not permanent. You need to trust the process and find love and self-worth, which will keep you going as you anticipate to conquer everything that comes your way. You need to have interpersonal communication to help you derive new strategies that will help you feel good about yourself. If things haven’t been going the right way is maybe as a result of missing puzzle or use of defective strategies. Try to come up with a plan that should help you make necessary changes that will have a positive impact on your life. Try to come up with ideas that should deprive you of feeling low and negative. Evade everything that makes you unhappy, as well as lose hope.
12. Practice positive self-talk
How you speak to yourself will shape the person you are. If you focus on negative self-talk, your thought process will be negative as will how you view yourself. Realize that something as simple as speaking kindly to yourself in your head will be transformative for you. Your feelings about yourself will change if you replace bad habits with good habits and negative thoughts with happy thoughts. The moment you start doing this, the world becomes brighter for you. For example, you can recite positive affirmations daily. Doing this often will get you to start believing the words you recite. Give yourself the pep talk that pumps you up and you'll feel better about yourself.
13. Find self-appreciation
You also need to learn how to feel better about yourself and appreciate others, and in turn, they will understand you. Once others understand you, you feel great about yourself, which will enhance your self-esteem and confidence so you feel better. The reason why many people don’t feel good about themselves is mainly that they fail to appreciate themselves. You need to love yourself so that others can love you. Don’t entertain any negative feelings. You were born a fighter, and you should never back down from any adversity life throws at you.
Create a simple morning routine that every time you wake up and remind yourself that you are a victor. As you progress, always bear the notion and idea that you will be successful in everything you do. When you go to school, tell yourself that you get good grades in every class. If you have a job, tell yourself that you will do the best job every day at work. Encouraging words will keep you moving as you dodge the barricades that may be along the journey. If you keep reminding yourself of positive things, you will become successful.
14. Write down your wins
What are some things you've been doing for yourself lately? Get a sense of your accomplishments by writing them down as it happens. You might screenshot positive conversations, high praise, or other wins and place them all in an "accomplishments folder." You could also journal your wins. Don't discredit anything you've overcome. Whether you overcome obstacles like substance abuse or learn new skills to practice improving your health through exercise, there are many things you do right. Make a note of them, and not just a mental one you'll forget later.
15. Improve your mental health
You can improve your mental health in many ways. You can find a therapist or a life coach who will challenge your ability to get better. If you don't mind telling people the truth about your situation, you'll achieve a lot of success by getting actionable feedback from a professional who will treat you. You can create a vision board, begin reading meditation books, work on your physical health, and live in the moment. The moment you start making positive change, that's when you finally learn how to feel better about yourself. All you're really doing is working with someone who will coach you to level up or help you reframe your thinking, so you can begin being happy again. Chat about your feelings with a trusted professional and treat it seriously. Do the work your therapist recommends to you and start feeling like a better version of you. You deserve it.
Feel better
With that, remember that everything in life is temporary, including life itself, and this too shall pass. Have patience with whatever you’re struggling with and practice grounding techniques. Do you have a way that helps you feel better about yourself? Let us know!
